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arirang's review
4.0
As he bore a vague resemblance to the Emperor, the sailors on board the Hermann-Augustus Stoeffer had nicknamed him Napoleon. And so, for convenience, that is what we shall call him.
Besides, he was Napoleon. . . .
Simon Leys was the pen name of the renowned Sinologist Pierre Ryckmans, one chosen to avoid issues on his trips to China from his forthright opinions (no fan of Maoism, he clashed with leftist Parisian intellectuals of the time).
His 1986 novel La Mort de Napoleon was translated into English, as The Death of Napoleon, by Patricia Clancy and himself in 1991 and won the 2nd Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 1992, the forerunner of the Man Booker International, from, it has to be said, a relatively obscure longlist (25 years later I recognise only 2 other books of the 12).
The delusion of grandeur that one is Napoleon, now a common trope, dates back to the 19th Century, but perhaps not so widespread as in this book. A first literary mention can be found as early as the 1890 treatise [b:The Principles of Psychology|55966|The Principles of Psychology|William James|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1406657469s/55966.jpg|44156413] , where William James describes enducing such a delusion as a typical demonstration of hypnotism, and "a character in William De Morgan’s 1907 novel Alice-for-Short thinks he’s Napoleon but is counseled to keep it to himself lest he get locked up. The earliest filmed version of the gag is almost certainly found in the 1917 Stan Laurel short Nuts in May". (Source https://straightdope.com/columns/read/2764/napoleon-complex/)
The Death of Napoleon, a cleverly constructed 130 page novel(la), asks us: what if the person suffering the delusion really is who he thinks he is?
Napoleon has escaped from his exile on St Helena, swapped for a double, and is returning to Europe to arouse his still loyal supporters and reclaim his position.
At no stage was anything left to his initiative, every move had been minutely planned for him, and each time he was notified at the last minute, by a series of anonymous agents, themselves mere cogs that fitted blindly into a huge, mysterious machine.
...
This new contact would guide him to the huge secret organization that had been prepared to propel him back into power, and which needed only one spark of his genius to be set in motion.
An organisation so secret that the conspirators themselves did not know the very object of their association. Although the membership could already be counted in tens of thousands, no two members knew each other. Under such conditions, they naturally had no way of knowing that the author of this gigantic scheme- an obscure young mathematician - had already departed the world two years earlier, carried off by brain fever! However, the complex mechanism that his brilliant mind had designed was so perfect, and every detail had been planned with such precision, that the wheels kept turning blindly day after day, month after month, without being affected in the slightest by the disappearance of their anonymous creator.
Except the perfect plan is derailed completely when the Hermann Augustus Stoeffer, the brig taking Napoleon, in the guise of a lowly deck hand Eugene Lenormand, from Cape Town to Bordeaux, instead diverts at the last minute to Antwerp, a mundane decision made by some shopkeeper, based on the prices of molasses or indigo.
Napoleon is not one to give up hope:
He has always had the unshakable conviction that all setbacks that have happened in his life, even those that seemed the most painful and futile, must in some way or another actively contribute to the working out of his destiny.
He visits the battlefields of Waterloo, already turned into a tourist attraction, finding several inns claimed to be where he spent the night before the battle (none of which he recognises) and getting into an argument with the grizzled veteran who gives guided tours (and who turns out to have lost his leg in a drunken accident, not on the battlefield) as to the precise disposition of forces during the battle. He leaves Brussels without remembering that common seamen have to pay for their hotel accommodation.
At one point en route to Paris he thinks he has been recognised, hopefully by a fellow conspirator. Alas..
“Sergeant, we’ve got the man!” the gendarme announces, looking pleased with himself.
The Man! This is what all the crowned head of Europe used to call him, in fear an trembling, as though the four syllables of his Christian name were a thunderbolt that could topple their thrones at the first distant rumble...
“Eugene Lenormand, wanted for failure to pay a hotel bill.”
But he finds his way to Paris and a group, not of the plotters but as least of loyalists to the Emperor, only to be greeted by the news that Napoleon, or rather his double on St Helena, has died. At first, highly moved by their grief, he soon realises it presents a major barrier: he will be battling against a Napoleon who was largely than life - the memory of Napoleon! (a figure that now, ageing, bald and out of shape he increasingly no longer physically resembles) and as for the men they enjoyed their despair: they sale into it with a kind of relish, as one voluptuously sinks into sleep after a very long vigil. If anyone had tried to wake them at that time, he would have found them not only deaf but hostile as well.
Offered accommodation by the widow of them, who has a humble and struggling business selling watermelons, and biding time while he plots what to do, still in the guise of Eugene, he turns his attentions to successfully revitalising her business deploying the detailed and unique strategies that led to his military successes.
Another Bonapartist, an ex medical officer, sees through this to recognise Eugene’s identity but seeing his Emperor calmly settle into his newfound bourgeois prosperity... he found himself in a position similar to that of a believer to whom God has just revealed the fact that He intends to retire.
Napoleon sees the chance to begin his campaign to reclaim power, but the medic tells him it is too late and, to convince him, takes him to the asylum of one Dr Quinton, filled, of course, with delusional Napoleons. Seeing one such figure, complete with homemade costume and trademark mannerisms, the real Napoleon realises:
This miserable wreck presented an image of his model a thousand times more faithful, more worthy, and more convincing than the unlikely bald fruiterer.
Napoleon is chastened (he began to perceive more clearly that greatness should always be on its guard against the snares of happiness) but not deterred and starts to plot his return on his own, using his extensive knowledge to plan a secret and complex campaign of claims of loyalty and blackmail to gradually build up a power base within the Government so that a clandestine power would grow gradually within the official power structure, replicating its functions and sapping its energies, until the day when, sure of its hidden network, with one stroke the former could take over from the latter.
But his plotting seems to be theoretical rather than actual and takes place entirely in the detailed written dossiers he prepares, increasingly neglecting the watermelon business, and when he hints at his true identity to the widow, a visit from Dr Quinton soon follows...
A highly entertaining read and at the same time a compelling explanation of identity and power, of outer reality versus inner belief, and a worthy winner of the IFFP.
Besides, he was Napoleon. . . .
Simon Leys was the pen name of the renowned Sinologist Pierre Ryckmans, one chosen to avoid issues on his trips to China from his forthright opinions (no fan of Maoism, he clashed with leftist Parisian intellectuals of the time).
His 1986 novel La Mort de Napoleon was translated into English, as The Death of Napoleon, by Patricia Clancy and himself in 1991 and won the 2nd Independent Foreign Fiction Prize in 1992, the forerunner of the Man Booker International, from, it has to be said, a relatively obscure longlist (25 years later I recognise only 2 other books of the 12).
The delusion of grandeur that one is Napoleon, now a common trope, dates back to the 19th Century, but perhaps not so widespread as in this book. A first literary mention can be found as early as the 1890 treatise [b:The Principles of Psychology|55966|The Principles of Psychology|William James|https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1406657469s/55966.jpg|44156413] , where William James describes enducing such a delusion as a typical demonstration of hypnotism, and "a character in William De Morgan’s 1907 novel Alice-for-Short thinks he’s Napoleon but is counseled to keep it to himself lest he get locked up. The earliest filmed version of the gag is almost certainly found in the 1917 Stan Laurel short Nuts in May". (Source https://straightdope.com/columns/read/2764/napoleon-complex/)
The Death of Napoleon, a cleverly constructed 130 page novel(la), asks us: what if the person suffering the delusion really is who he thinks he is?
Napoleon has escaped from his exile on St Helena, swapped for a double, and is returning to Europe to arouse his still loyal supporters and reclaim his position.
At no stage was anything left to his initiative, every move had been minutely planned for him, and each time he was notified at the last minute, by a series of anonymous agents, themselves mere cogs that fitted blindly into a huge, mysterious machine.
...
This new contact would guide him to the huge secret organization that had been prepared to propel him back into power, and which needed only one spark of his genius to be set in motion.
An organisation so secret that the conspirators themselves did not know the very object of their association. Although the membership could already be counted in tens of thousands, no two members knew each other. Under such conditions, they naturally had no way of knowing that the author of this gigantic scheme- an obscure young mathematician - had already departed the world two years earlier, carried off by brain fever! However, the complex mechanism that his brilliant mind had designed was so perfect, and every detail had been planned with such precision, that the wheels kept turning blindly day after day, month after month, without being affected in the slightest by the disappearance of their anonymous creator.
Except the perfect plan is derailed completely when the Hermann Augustus Stoeffer, the brig taking Napoleon, in the guise of a lowly deck hand Eugene Lenormand, from Cape Town to Bordeaux, instead diverts at the last minute to Antwerp, a mundane decision made by some shopkeeper, based on the prices of molasses or indigo.
Napoleon is not one to give up hope:
He has always had the unshakable conviction that all setbacks that have happened in his life, even those that seemed the most painful and futile, must in some way or another actively contribute to the working out of his destiny.
He visits the battlefields of Waterloo, already turned into a tourist attraction, finding several inns claimed to be where he spent the night before the battle (none of which he recognises) and getting into an argument with the grizzled veteran who gives guided tours (and who turns out to have lost his leg in a drunken accident, not on the battlefield) as to the precise disposition of forces during the battle. He leaves Brussels without remembering that common seamen have to pay for their hotel accommodation.
At one point en route to Paris he thinks he has been recognised, hopefully by a fellow conspirator. Alas..
“Sergeant, we’ve got the man!” the gendarme announces, looking pleased with himself.
The Man! This is what all the crowned head of Europe used to call him, in fear an trembling, as though the four syllables of his Christian name were a thunderbolt that could topple their thrones at the first distant rumble...
“Eugene Lenormand, wanted for failure to pay a hotel bill.”
But he finds his way to Paris and a group, not of the plotters but as least of loyalists to the Emperor, only to be greeted by the news that Napoleon, or rather his double on St Helena, has died. At first, highly moved by their grief, he soon realises it presents a major barrier: he will be battling against a Napoleon who was largely than life - the memory of Napoleon! (a figure that now, ageing, bald and out of shape he increasingly no longer physically resembles) and as for the men they enjoyed their despair: they sale into it with a kind of relish, as one voluptuously sinks into sleep after a very long vigil. If anyone had tried to wake them at that time, he would have found them not only deaf but hostile as well.
Offered accommodation by the widow of them, who has a humble and struggling business selling watermelons, and biding time while he plots what to do, still in the guise of Eugene, he turns his attentions to successfully revitalising her business deploying the detailed and unique strategies that led to his military successes.
Another Bonapartist, an ex medical officer, sees through this to recognise Eugene’s identity but seeing his Emperor calmly settle into his newfound bourgeois prosperity... he found himself in a position similar to that of a believer to whom God has just revealed the fact that He intends to retire.
Napoleon sees the chance to begin his campaign to reclaim power, but the medic tells him it is too late and, to convince him, takes him to the asylum of one Dr Quinton, filled, of course, with delusional Napoleons. Seeing one such figure, complete with homemade costume and trademark mannerisms, the real Napoleon realises:
This miserable wreck presented an image of his model a thousand times more faithful, more worthy, and more convincing than the unlikely bald fruiterer.
Napoleon is chastened (he began to perceive more clearly that greatness should always be on its guard against the snares of happiness) but not deterred and starts to plot his return on his own, using his extensive knowledge to plan a secret and complex campaign of claims of loyalty and blackmail to gradually build up a power base within the Government so that a clandestine power would grow gradually within the official power structure, replicating its functions and sapping its energies, until the day when, sure of its hidden network, with one stroke the former could take over from the latter.
But his plotting seems to be theoretical rather than actual and takes place entirely in the detailed written dossiers he prepares, increasingly neglecting the watermelon business, and when he hints at his true identity to the widow, a visit from Dr Quinton soon follows...
A highly entertaining read and at the same time a compelling explanation of identity and power, of outer reality versus inner belief, and a worthy winner of the IFFP.
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